Rocking Cambodia: Rise of a Pop Diva

Format: 1 x 59 / 1 x 75 Broadcaster(s):
ABC,
BBC
Available in HD

In 2009, wandering Australian musician Julien Poulson walks into a Phnom Penh karaoke bar. At the microphone is Srey Thy, a poor village girl whose lifelong dream is to become a professional singer. Nothing could have prepared them for what happened next…

Their meeting leads to a passionate romance and the formation of dynamic rock ‘n’ roll band The Cambodian Space Project. Reviving classics from Cambodia’s golden cultural age of the 1960s and ‘70s, The Cambodian Space Project soon wows audiences across the world, from London and Paris to Hong Kong and Sydney.

Filmed over five years from the band's inception to its first overseas performances and beyond, Rocking Cambodia: Rise of a Pop Diva is a musical roller-coaster ride filled with passion, ambition and cross-cultural challenges, from the ancient Khmer Kingdom of Angkor to the streets of Brixton all the way to the Motown Studios of Detroit.

Featuring incredible graphics and rare cinematic archive from the personal films of King Sihanouk, this is the joyful, sad, uplifting and strikingly intimate story of struggling performers whose path from obscurity, poverty and trauma to fame and no fortune has never been easy.